Raleigh, N.C. — Wake County schools have responded to recent complaints about bus service by taking another look at the policies drivers use to make sure students get where they are going.
The district is working on a new system to track younger students, to make sure they get on and off the bus at the right stop.
“We can have 99.9-percent accuracy and that is not good enough. We want to maintain – earn and maintain the trust of our parents,” said Don Haydon, the district's chief facilities and operations officer.
In a letter to Superintendent Del Burns, Haydon called for a revaluation of the school transportation system, including:
- Policies and procedures to be reviewed.
- Changes to be made where necessary.
- Parents, educators and bus drivers to have input.
"We want to take a look at the processes to make sure everything is working as good as it can be,” Haydon said.
The revaluation aims to avoid a recurrence of complaints filed by two Wake Forest mothers. They say their elementary students were let off at the wrong bus stop, by mistake, last month.
"I was distraught that my child was lost,” Amanda Medlin said.
Medlin said the bus driver dropped off her 5-year-old son, Austin, four miles from home. It happened on his first day of kindergarten.
For nearly a half-hour, Medlin said her son wandered looking for help. He finally knocked on Nikki Lupton’s door.
“He walked right in and he said, ‘I live far, far away,”” Lupton recalled.
A similar thing happened a week later to Brady McGlohon. A 6-year-old, who attends the same Wake Forest elementary school as Austin.
Brady's bus driver has since retired from the school system. Austin's bus driver is still employed.
"I do not have trust in the school transportation system at all,” Medlin said.
Parents interested in voicing concerns over bus policies should contact the Wake County School Board.



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August 5, 2008 5:17 p.m.
It solves the problem by having less time on the bus due to shorter routes, not having islands of assignments were only half-a-dozen kids get off and increases the chances that the bus driver will know where things are. Look at the assignment maps and tell me that plotting bus routes through those is an easy task.
Simplify everything and focus on the end product - the child's education. This is what we need from WCPSS. They spend so much time, effort and money on peripheral concerns.
August 5, 2008 3:22 p.m.
How is that going to solve the problem? If it's not within a reasonable walking/biking/skating, etc. distance, or on a busy road, kids will still be riding buses. There would likely also be a large number of parents who wouldn't want their kids walking/biking/skating, etc. due to their youth (do you think a 5 year old should be walking to school alone?) or because they'd be afraid some nutjob would kidnap their child.
August 5, 2008 3:17 p.m.
This may not sound like a good idea, but these are the same thing that have happened every year. Reviews do nothing. Boycott the buses. Car pool, do whatever you can, get your kids off the bus. Only then will changes be made. Why? Because MONEY is tied to those buses and we all know what really talks.
My kids don't ride the bus and never will. I do transportation research and there have been studies where almost one third of school buses would have been shut down by OSHA because of air quality were they a workplace. The more you know, the less likely you are to put your kids on those yellow cans of death.
August 5, 2008 3:10 p.m.
August 5, 2008 12:44 p.m.